Island Journal

Alaska’s Silvery Gold Rush

Every ounce is valuable. So valuable, in fact, that those difficult first cuts, if done poorly, will leave dollars on the floor. It’s mostly a mechanized process, but the head and tail are removed with a handheld knife. Then the fish’s glistening body is placed on a short conveyor belt… SEE MORE

Island Journal

A North Haven Gift—June Hopkins

The sign on the front of the 19th-century frame building is very much like the woman who has run the business inside for the last 60 years. gift shop, it reads. No more, no less. June Hopkins, who turned 90 on November 2, 2013, is as plainspoken and direct as… SEE MORE

Business

Kathie Iannicelli in her greenhouse on Monhegan

Island Journal

My Garden in Your Backyard

Monhegan in late January is the antithesis of the island’s summertime buzz of endless work, activities and hordes of day-trippers. The days are short and bitter: the wind surges off the harbor and shakes the spruce and pushes against the house clapboards violently. And at night, with the stars frozen… SEE MORE

Island Journal

In It For The Long Haul

To many residents and visitors alike, summer on a Maine island means one thing above all others: that most wonderful of culinary and sensory experiences—a Maine lobster dinner—succulent white meat dripping with drawn butter, served near the ocean. While finding the perfect spot to enjoy a lobster, visitors may stroll… SEE MORE

Island Journal

Islesford’s Creative Economy

The Cranberry Isles consist of five islands that, in the words of the historian Ted Spurling, “fit into the Great Harbor of Mount Desert Island, nestling nicely under its shorter arm.” They are, from largest to smallest, Great Cranberry, Little Cranberry (also called Islesford), Sutton, Baker and Bear. The islands… SEE MORE

Island Journal

The Gardner Bill

In May of 1912, a group of fishermen from Essex County, Massachusetts, enlisted the support of their congressional representative, Augustus P. Gardner, to push forward a bill to ban the use of otter trawls on Georges Bank. It was a bold move, though not unprecedented in pre–World War I US… SEE MORE